I've always found Gavin Gardiner to be very forthcoming. One just can't rely fully on a description in a catalog. I suggest one does research first. If there is something I am interested in I call him on the phone. If you are cordial and ask informed questions he will often take the time and go over the gun with you. If he says a gun is "a bit tired" you should be able to interpret that. I would never bid on a gun without getting the barrel measurements, etc. first, and then speaking with him.
I'm not directing this comment at anyone, just stating that Gavin is "one of the good guys."
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My question to Holts would be "Are you alleging, and can I rely on your stipulation that the Purdey you sold would pass proof by British standards?" If one had brought that gun into the Proof House they perform a general inspection and that cracked action would have immediately, I believe, made them reject the gun for reproof until the defect was properly mended. Perhaps the cracks occurred when the gun was reproven and it somehow escaped being deactivated????How then did it find its way into the sale?
Perhaps if they sold that gun to a British buyer and the gun remained in the UK they and perhaps so others would have a thorny problem on their hands....
Once upon a time there was a certain former gun dealer in Maine who made a business of buying up British guns that would never pass muster in the UK because they were out of proof, needed rejointing, cracked actions, etc and selling them in the US - how he got them in is another story - and selling them as "collectors items" so, he felt, no implied shootability thus no liability.
He wasn't the only one - there was a time in the not distant past when lots of British guns offered in the US could never have been sold in the UK. The good folks at Woodcock Hill were always sticklers about their guns being in proof, and we owe them a debt of gratitude for this.
Last edited by snowleopard; 01/23/08 03:59 AM.
